


The Headache Vent Fic Part Two

by SilenceIsGolden15



Series: Voltron Oneshots [37]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Chronic Pain, Gen, Headaches & Migraines, Light Angst, Nausea, Sick Keith (Voltron), Worried Shiro (Voltron), vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 11:01:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17744690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilenceIsGolden15/pseuds/SilenceIsGolden15
Summary: The author still gets migraines. So Keith does too. Sorry Keith.





	The Headache Vent Fic Part Two

Keith’s head ached. It ached, it ached, it  _ ached.  _

He braced a forearm on the table, trying to keep himself from swaying under the onslaught of dizziness fighting to take him to the floor. The paladins had come directly from training to lunch as usual and he was hot-- his undersuit sticking to his skin. He resisted the urge to run back to his room and rip it off. He had to keep it together. He couldn’t freak out and complain in front of the others. He would just duck into his room on the way back to training and grab one of those pills Coran had made him.

“Food’s ready!” Hunk called as he and Coran bustled into the room, laden by stacks of plates. Normally anything Hunk made would smell delicious, but today it made his stomach turn. Still, he took his portion, and mechanically shoved the food into his mouth as he distracted himself by thinking about the pill bottle waiting in his room. 

It was a calculated risk. The first couple of days they’d worked perfectly, and Keith had never been more elated in his life. They didn’t banish the pain entirely, but having just a little relief after a lifetime of not having anything at all was practically a miracle. 

But then he started getting dizzy when he took them. Horrendously dizzy. So-dizzy-his-eyes-wouldn’t-focus dizzy. So he stopped taking them, but the dizziness kept on. Maybe it was a ramped up version of the lightheadedness he’d been feeling lately when the headaches came. Maybe it was something else. But he knew if he took the pill and his head started spinning, training would be far more difficult than usual.

But it was that or dealing with a headache that made him want to bury himself in his bed and not move. Today, which was the lesser of two evils? 

Well… if he was going to be dizzy anyway… 

“Keith?”

He looked up. The others were finished eating and rising to their feet, and Shiro was talking to him. 

“You ready to go back to training?”

Keith swallowed against the pressure at the back of his throat and put his fork down on his half full plate.

“Yeah. Just gimme a minute to go to my room.”

“Ok, see you in a few,” Shiro replied easily, and then he was gone. Keith planted both hands on the table and took a breath. 

He pushed himself upright. 

The entire room tilted on its axis and he fell back into his seat, one hand grasping at his temple as he grimaced at the shard of pain embedding itself behind his eyes. 

Fuck. If he couldn’t even get to his room, how was he supposed to train? To keep up with the other paladins? To do his damn job? 

_ Come on, Kogane. Work through it. A fucking headache is no excuse to shirk responsibility.  _

He tried to get up again, and this time he succeeded, though he still needed a hand on the table to help him. 

_ Pull it together. Just do it. _

He let go of the table and started towards the door. The first few steps were straight, then he wavered, his feet veering to the left without his permission. Just before he lost his balance completely he caught himself on the door jam and paused for a couple of steadying breaths. 

God, whatever this was causing the vertigo, whether it was connected to the headaches or not, was getting worse. Fast. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. If they were just bad migraine attacks that even meds couldn’t help, it could impact his ability to fly Red. And Shiro would be concerned and insist he sit out, and then they’d need a new Red Paladin, and then he’d be useless, and they’d make him leave. 

He couldn’t let that happen. 

So he needed to get to training. He needed to hide it. 

He let go of the door and continued on his way. 

Maybe it was a brain tumor or something. That wouldn’t be good, though maybe the pods could fix that the way they couldn’t fix pointless pain from nowhere. 

Keith didn’t stop for his pills. 

When he reached the training room the door slid open for him, revealing the other paladins already doing their warm up exercises. Shiro turned and gave him a smile, but then his expression blurred, and Keith’s shoulder rammed into the door frame as his tilted. Fuck, his head  _ hurt.  _ It hurt so, so badly--

“Keith? You ok, bud?”

Keith didn’t realize his eyes were closed until he had to open them. The light seared and ached in his skull. 

“Yeah. I--I’m fine.”

Pressure grew at the back of his throat, pressing at the roof of his mouth. He swallowed it down. Shiro was still watching, brow slightly furrowed. 

“I’m fine,” he said, “I’m fine.”

 


End file.
